Maybe wrinkles aren't so bad.
A Gen Z take on ageing in the era of filler, filters, and frozen faces...
The other morning, I overheard a conversation that stopped me mid-coffee sip.
"I need Botox. My forehead is literally moving."
She couldn't have been older than 22.
I looked around my lecture hall and realised something: Botox is no longer reserved for Hollywood or women approaching 50. It is as common as laser hair removal and as casual as a morning peel. Girls barely out of their teens, booking injectables with the same nonchalance as a bikini wax. And the accessibility is terrifying.
But when does it end?
First, it was noses—one scroll through 2014 Tumblr and suddenly everyone needed a button nose. Then it was lips, then jawlines, then threads. Now? It is wrinkles—except not just wrinkles, preventative wrinkles. We are pre-emptively ageing before we have ever lived.
And yet, we call it ‘self-care.’
The Search Bar Speaks
Ping. Ping. The Google search bar fills. A whole generation of women, begging the internet for solutions to something that is not even a problem yet.
“How old do I have to be to get Botox?”
“How to erase fine lines before 25?”
“Best skincare to stop ageing.”
I can’t help but wonder—what exactly are we so afraid of?
Ageing is a privilege, so why does it feel like a punishment?
I wonder if we were alone on an island, with no reflections, no cameras, no mirrors—would we still want to inject our faces? Would we still crave frozen foreheads and unlined expressions?
If beauty is about looking alive, why are we so desperate to erase every marker of life?
The Filler Trap
The promise of tweakments is always the same: It’s just a little. It’ll wear off. You can dissolve it.
Except, filler doesn’t just go away. It migrates. It stretches the skin. It collects in places it shouldn’t. The cycle never ends, because once we start tweaking, we start seeing flaws where there were none. We go in for a “touch-up,” leave with another syringe, and suddenly, the girl who just wanted a little freshening up has a face unrecognisable to herself.
I have seen it up close. The women in my life who “don’t talk about it”, subtly tweak here and there, until their faces stay frozen in time while the rest of them age. And maybe that’s the real fear. Not just wrinkles, but the inevitable: that time will pass, that no amount of filler, Botox, or resurfacing can truly stop it.
What Are We Really Afraid of?
Growing up, I’d hear women around me say, “You’re so lucky—you have young skin.”
“I miss my pre-wrinkle days.”
“God, I used to wear dresses like that, before my legs aged.”
They spoke of their youth like something lost, like a house they once lived in but could never return to.
It never struck me as strange until I got older. Why were grown women comparing themselves to girls half their age? Why was ageing something to fear, rather than just something to be?
I think back to my mother’s words when I questioned getting filler:
"Why are you worried about something you don't even have yet?"
And she was right. We are pre-emptively mourning something we haven’t even lost.
So maybe wrinkles aren’t the enemy. Maybe they’re just proof that we were here—that we laughed, that we cried, that we lived.
And maybe, just maybe, that’s something worth keeping.